


lips stained berry red

by ElasticElla



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, F/F, Fix-It, Podfic Available
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-27
Updated: 2020-02-27
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:21:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22928641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElasticElla/pseuds/ElasticElla
Summary: Triss portals to Creyden, anticipation and nerves tangled in her throat. Her very first assignment, and it isn’t to Temeria like she’d been planning for the past season.
Relationships: Triss Merigold/Renfri | Shrike
Comments: 9
Kudos: 33
Collections: Writing Rainbow Red





	lips stained berry red

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reeby10](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reeby10/gifts).



> so i took that ‘canon timeline is more of a suggestion’ tag & to quote a flock of seagulls, i ran, i ran so far away

Triss portals to Creyden, anticipation and nerves tangled in her throat. Her very first assignment, and it isn’t to Temeria like she’d been planning for the past season. Last night, the king and queen of Creyden had fallen in battle, supporting their neighbors, their mage with them. 

She doesn’t expect a warm welcome from Princess, well, Queen Renfri. As a babe, she just escaped death from the hand of a twisted mage, Stregobor put down in her very nursery. Between that and her father, step-mother, both being dead, she wouldn’t be surprised if she was told to leave. (A childish piece of her wishes for it, but she knows better- to be rejected now would mean never being a court mage, she wouldn’t be sent to Temeria. She’d be stuck peddling her wares in some musty corner of a busy city.) 

A yawn forces its way past her lips, a small mercy that no one has been sent to retrieve her at the gates. Last night she wasn’t able to sleep, reading all the scrolls their library had on Creyden’s history. There wasn’t all that much on the small northern kingdom. It feels like one of those dreams where Tissaia was demanding she do the spell all the others were practicing, but she didn’t know the words, the motions, and everyone else was already done.

The castle is quiet- not eerily so, but worryingly. She spots staff easily enough, and a handful of guards. The halls of Temeria were always loud, whether it be by laughter or arguing, nobles don’t care one whit for silence. 

A girl sits upon the throne, sprawling really, sitting sideways with her legs tossed over one arm. She plays with a small dagger, and two guards flank her, neither of which have a hand on their weapon. Triss frowns, for all they know, she could be an assassin. 

Soft as the leather soles are, her footsteps are amplified as she approaches the throne. Renfri stops playing with her knife as she nears, eyes glittering. Anger she recognizes too late, should have been expecting it. 

“Queen Renfri, I-” 

“Wait,” she interrupts, a cruel smile on her lips. “Let me guess.” She stands up, circling her close, “You are the half sister of Prince Peregrine, here to offer your hand in marriage and a dozen caskets of dusty ale.” 

“I’m Triss Merigold, sent by the Brotherhood to serve you and your kingdom.” 

“My very next guess,” Renfri declares, sitting back on her throne. “Are you a necromancer?” 

“No.” 

“Gifted in illusions perhaps? Warfare?” 

Triss swallows, “My talents are in potions and nature. There are applications-”

Renfri holds up a hand, eyes hard, “Is this a jape? _You_ are who the Brotherhood sent me?” 

A courier rushes in then before Triss can answer, a lucky thing with the ire rising on her tongue. (She knows better, and Renfri is but a young woman of twenty-two.)

“Lord Steergart of Kaedwen has sent me in his steed to offer his hand-” 

“If he’s too old to ride a horse, how does he expect to ride me?” Renfri snaps, anger blazing in her eyes. And oh, she must have been only annoyed before, a rage building up in her, curls seemingly electrified. “Would he take me in my funeral blacks?” 

The courier’s eyes are wide, gaze going between the Queen and herself. Triss takes the moment, takes the courier’s arm and turns him around. 

She speaks softly for appearances, loud enough in the silent hall for Renfri to hear every word. “My dear sir, do excuse the Queen’s manner, she is still in the first stage of mourning. When it is over and she is back in her right mind, she will be able to hear Lord Steergart’s proposal clearly.” 

The courier nods rapidly, “My apologies, I did not realize she followed the southern traditions.” 

“Her late mother,” Triss claims, catches how his expression falls with a bit of vindictive glee. 

“Ah, she will be observing the entire year?” 

“It’s only the first day, I couldn’t say,” Triss demurs, bringing him to the door. “But given her mood this day of late,” Triss says, dropping her voice to the barest whisper, “I think you’ll agree it wise.” 

“Yes, yes, I can hardly be blamed for- yes, good day madam.” 

The courier leaves in a rush, and Triss turns around, the Queen right behind her. She seems small like this, of a similar height to herself. 

“Walk with me Triss.” 

The guards don’t follow, and Triss wonders if its their inadequacy or the Queen’s arrogance to leave a newcomer alone with the new crown. 

“Do they teach you to use blasphemy to gain your way in Aretuza?” 

“You could send a letter tomorrow saying you’ve decided against your mother’s traditions.” 

“And end up married to that old windbag sooner? No. What happens in a year?” 

Triss shrugs, following the Queen out to the gardens. They’re overgrown, half bramble and half-hidden flower buds. “As you’ve said, he is an old lord, he may not make so many moons. Or, more likely, you’ll gain a suitor you prefer before the year is up.” 

“But I must marry,” Renfri says, lips thin. “Calanthe is unmarried.” 

“Queen Calanthe has an heir,” Triss says, something doubtless the young queen knows. 

Renfri rolls her eyes, “Then I shall pick a child at random from the market tomorrow. Dress them in silks, and a decade of schooling later, they’ll be ready.” 

“A blood adoption would be possible, if not popular,” Triss admits. “It would make war more likely.” 

“Then a babe to claim as my own. What then?” 

Triss swallows, “Then I would brew a potion so the child grows up in your image and another’s. Detectable, but many children carry druid boons, it would be assumed a gift of beauty or youth.” 

Renfri stops, gripping her hands tight. “Truly? Such emancipation for my future is possible?”

And Triss can’t help wondering at her step-mother for not properly educating her charge, or if perhaps Renfri was too young to listen then. “Yes.” 

Renfri smiles, the light catching her hair, looking like a vernal goddess, and oh, Triss didn’t prepare for that. 

“Excellent. We shall find you a room, and then do the first step of mourning together.” 

“Oh?” Triss asks, mind going wild with ridiculous ideas that have nothing to do with death rites. 

Her lips form a crooked grin, “You’ll have to shear my hair. It’s only proper.” 

.

It is a cruelness that Renfri looks just as beautiful with her hair cropped short, like a trickster fae of old. A cruelness that Triss’s quarters are adjacent to the Queen’s, that she has become her closest counsel. A cruelness that Renfri laughs so easily around her, gossiping about the court that slowly refills her halls. 

A cruelness that Triss can’t bring herself to stop any of it, falling face first in love with her Queen. 

.

Renfri pouts as she undoes her hair, Triss lounging on the couch. She’s been awake for far too many hours, can be forgiven the impropriety. 

“The nerve of that, that alleged Prince to join the remembrance feast without asking.” 

Triss doesn’t bother pointing out the technicality he had slipped in under, surely she would mention it herself in a-

“And claiming losing his friend was akin to my father! The audacity.” 

“You didn’t find him handsome?” Triss asks, truly curious. With his dark hair and silver eyes, he had more than a few ladies and lords pawing over his favor. Admittedly even beyond his looks, the prince was one of the better candidates for Renfri’s hand, and there hadn’t been an orphan babe in the kingdom. (Not yet, but surely it will happen. An unfortunate truth.)

“Pretty as a peacock and just as useless,” Renfri spits out, pulling the last pin from her hair. Triss decides against mentioning the small armada he has, because Renfri has already made up her mind, not because she holds any bias here. Renfri rubs her temples, “No matter. Once there is a babe they will stop.” 

“They will slow,” Triss softly corrects, for Renfri has too much beauty and a kingdom of her own to ever stop the suitors without a ring. 

Renfri’s lips twitch up into a smile, “But by then you’ll be so good at turning them away at the gates.” 

Triss laughs, “As you wish.” 

“I wish many things,” Renfri muses, sitting on the couch beside her, and Triss folds her feet under herself. 

“Oh? Anything I can grant you?” 

Renfri’s cheeks are flushed, though she had no wine tonight- sobriety is important to remembrance. “A kiss.” 

Triss is certain she misheard her, but Renfri’s leaning in, and Triss throws caution to the wind, meeting her lips. Renfri tastes like freshly plucked wild berries, nonsensical for she knows exactly what was on tonight’s menu, and Triss tilts her head, the kiss turning deeper. 

Renfri’s hands are sure on her shoulders, heavy and warm. “Would you grant more?” 

“Whatever I can grant you,” Triss says, and this time it feels like a promise.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] lips stained berry red](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28547958) by [Chantress](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chantress/pseuds/Chantress)




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